Evil NASCAR Domino

Among the loose parts that populate the outdoor classroom are such bottom of the toy chest type things as cheap-o party favors and cereal box give-aways. Like any other kind of garbage at the preschool, they're given one more life, sometimes two or three more lives, before being relegated to the landfill.

Yesterday, we were gathering a collection of these loose parts for the purposes of "playing a story." We set ourselves up in the sand pit row boat and manufactured a few silly tales incorporating such characters as "Santa Baby," fairies we called "Yellow-y," "Green-y," and "Red-y," "Evil Rainbow Pony," the mermaid "Dodecahedron," a girl named "Boy," and "Witchy Poo." After a few rounds, during an intermission, I reminded the kids that if they were hungry, they might want to grab a snack which had the effect of dispersing much of our group, who were indeed hungry and would be "right back."

While the others crowded down to the snack table, I was left with Wyatt, who "never" has snack because "I already had breakfast," and Deacon who tends to like to get his snack out of the way first thing. We decided we would collect some fresh storytelling fodder for when those other kids were done eating and began foraging around in the sand.

Wyatt popped up with his first find, "A domino!"

Sure enough, he held a domino tile with three spots on one end and five on the other.

I said, "It's a domino. It could be Super Domino."

Deacon topped me, "No, it could be NASCAR Domino."

And Wyatt added, "Evil NASCAR Domino."

I said, "I guess Evil NASCAR Domino is a bad guy."

Ignoring me, Wyatt followed his own train of thought on the matter, "Look . . . 1, 2, 3," counting the spots on one end of the tile.

Deacon wanted a closer look, "If there is 3 on one end and 2 on the other, then that makes 5," showing off a math fact he had already mastered.

Wyatt peered at the domino and counted, "One, 2, 3," then continuing with the other half of the tile, "4, 5, 6, 7, 8."

The boys studied the tile together for a moment. Deacon counted, "One, 2, 3," then continued on the other half of the tile, "One, 2, 3, 4, 5."

Wyatt confirmed the discovery, "There's three spots on this end and five spots on this end."

After a moment's reflection Deacon nodded, "And three and five make eight."

The boys nodded over the domino for a moment before tossing the 8-spotted Evil NASCAR Domino in the basket with the rest of the toys and returned to their hunt. 

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